Let’s not shy away from the truth. The Indian male mindset is culturally conditioned to viewing women in a condescending way. Men have fixed notions about how women should conduct themselves in priv ate and public, how they should dress and how they should interact with members of the opposite sex. Fundamentally, they set unwritten rules for women and expect them to follow it. If they get sexually harassed, the first automatic response is to detect whether they violated any or many of the rules. It’s a mindset not used to treating women as equal to men. Congress MP Abhijit Mukherjee’s remark reflects that. The male mindset has to change if we want more respect for women in the society.Read lessRead more

It is easy to extrapolate Abhijit Mukherjee’s statement to Indian males at large but that is definitely not the case. The average Indian male may be confused, and even insecure, about the entry of I ndian women into every domain of the work force but doesn’t share the same views as a social dinosaur like Mukherjee. Every man in India knows at least one woman in his life who has been the victim of some form of humiliation at the hands of male folk. Every average Indian male does fear for the security of a woman known to him when she has to do something as simple as travel at night, something he can do with impunity. Some like Mukherjee would prefer to go back to the traditional excuse of Western culture bashing to help secure women in the country. Unfortunately, Indian culture and customs as it stands has little to offer our women folk barring a modicum of security within the four walls of their home, that also only if they’re lucky. The average Indian male has much to gain from supporting the current protests in Delhi and would prefer that movements like these are successful.Read lessRead more